UL New Programme - BSc/MSc in Immersive Software Engineering - LM173
(Intake 2022)
University of Limerick has teamed up with a host of leading international technology companiesto redefine computer science education.
UL announced a new integrated undergraduate and Masters degree in partnership with over adozen leading tech companies from Ireland and around the world, including Analog Devices,Stripe, Zalando, Intercom, Shopify, Manna Aero, and many more.
The Immersive Software Engineering (ISE) programme at UL will seek to meet increased globaldemand for developer talent with the internet economy rapidly growing.
ISE will bring the concept of ‘residencies’, which are more common to medical degrees, and usethem as a key feature for the first time in computer science education. Just as trainee doctorsapply skills that they have studied in a classroom to the real world, so will ISE students, andthey’ll be doing it inside some of the world’s most exciting tech companies.
University of Limerick President, Professor Kerstin Mey said: “This partnership is an incrediblyexciting one for the University. UL has always been a dynamic and innovative university thatworks with industry to help shape the graduates of tomorrow. The employability rate of ULgraduates is consistently the highest of any Irish higher education institutions and this will onlyserve to increase that leading edge.
Software engineers and computer scientists can command high salaries straight out ofuniversity, and there is significant demand for more of them, with over three quarters oftech companies in Ireland saying the shortage of tech skills is losing them money.
John Collison, co-founder and President of Stripe, said: “Software engineers enjoyincredible careers solving some of the world’s most important problems in the fastestgrowing industries, yet we have nowhere near enough of them. Immersive SoftwareEngineering seeks to provide a great path for more secondary students - especially girls -into technology.”
Vincent Roche, CEO of Analog Devices, Inc (ADI) said: “The global demand for developingskilled software engineers driven by the connection of physical to cyber world and bigdata processing is growing at an exponential rate. As we at ADI solve the mostchallenging real-world problems in areas such as healthcare and industrial, we have anincreasing demand for these skillsets and see the need growing in coming years.
“We are delighted to work with UL to ensure students are getting real-world, hands-onexperience and are proud to collaborate with the University and great organisations suchas Stripe to help mould the next generation’s engineers.”
During the four years, ISE students will complete five paid residencies, each betweenthree and six months long. During residencies students will be a part of real, professionalteams solving problems like improving access to financial services around the world,fighting the climate crisis, and building next generation instrumentation for healthcare.
ISE has also received support from Enterprise Ireland, IDA Ireland, and venture investorsFrontline Ventures - among many others.
ISE intends to attract Ireland’s elite young talent and will gather learnings from theworld’s best computer science programmes, with all classes held in a dedicated studio,purpose-built for the course.
Students will work in small teams led by professors to advance important research andbuild new ideas.
UL’s Professor Stephen Kinsella, co-director of the programme who worked directly withindustry representatives to bring the project to fruition, explained: “We want this courseto change the way Ireland’s highest performing students think about computer scienceas a career option. We want to bring a more diverse audience to computer science. Andwe want ISE graduates to be the premier computer science talent around the world. We’rereally excited to be able to work with so many great partners to bring this vision to life.”
Industry Partners
Analog Devices, Aer Lingus, Facebook, Fenergo, First Derivatives, Frontline, Intercom,Manna Aero, MongoDB, Personio, Provizio, Shopify, Shutterstock, Soapbox Labs, Stripe,VIOTAS, Watershed, Workday, Zalando
Other supporters
Enterprise Ireland, Frontline Ventures, IDA Ireland, University of Limerick Foundation
See https://www.software-engineering.ie for more.
